Archiv für die Kategorie 'Other Drugs'

The study found increased cigarette prices due to taxes did not decrease smoking rates in people under 30, The Atlantic reports.

The researchers based their findings on data from the 2001-2006 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System surveys, which included 1.3 million people. They found increases in state cigarette prices were associated with increases in current drinking among people ages 65 and older, and binge and heavy drinking among those ages 21 to 29. They found reductions in smoking among adults ages 30 to 64, drinking among those ages 18 to 20, and binge drinking among those 65 and older.

“Researchers, practitioners, advocates, and policymakers should work together to understand and prepare for these unintended consequences of tobacco taxation policy,” the researchers wrote in the journal Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy.
(Source: Join Together, 07/17/12)

For generations we have been told that marijuana is the gateway drug to harder drugs, but a new study from the University of Florida contradicts that claim. Researchers believe that the true “gateway drug” is alcohol.

Marijuana has shouldered the blame for leading adolescents down the path to bigger and more addictive drugs, when in fact most teenagers begin drinking alcohol before they ever experiment with marijuana. …View slideshow: Study: Alcohol is more of a “gateway” drug than marijuana
(Source: Alcohol Reports, 07/17/12) examiner.com, 07/12/12

The U.S. had the second-lowest proportion of students who used tobacco and alcohol compared to their counterparts in 36 European countries, a new report indicates.

The results originate from coordinated school surveys about substance use from more than 100,000 students in some of the largest countries in Europe like Germany, France and Italy, as well as many smaller ones from both Eastern and Western Europe.

Because the methods and measures are largely modeled after the University of Michigan’s Monitoring the Future surveys in this country, comparisons are possible between the U.S. and European results. The 15- and 16-year-old students, who were drawn in nationally representative samples in almost all of the 36 countries, were surveyed last spring. American 10th graders in the 2011 Monitoring the Future studies are of the same age, so comparisons are possible. …
(Source: Medical News Today, 6/6/12)

Alcohol advertising should be banned in Europe in a bid to drive down excess boozing and associated ill health across the continent, concludes an alliance of experts in a new policy brief.

Alcohol is Europe’s most persistent and devastating addiction problem, says the Addiction and Lifestyles in Contemporary Europe – Reframing Addictions Project (ALICE-RAP), which brings together a network of over 150 researchers with expertise in many different aspects of addiction, including the social and economic impact. …

The briefing notes that the most effective and fairest policies are those which nudge people towards lower consumption, through price hikes, restrictions on availability, and advertising bans.

A minimum unit price, which the Scottish government announced its intention to introduce earlier this week, is supported by research, says the briefing. Scotland has opted for a 50 pence minimum unit price, while England is considering a 40 pence option. …

The evidence shows that alcohol adverts push people into higher and more harmful levels of consumption and trigger relapse among those trying to give up booze. Furthermore, it can encourage young people to start drinking, says the brief, which advocates a wholesale ban.

“Europeans drink more than twice the world’s average and alcohol represents the number one addiction problem in Europe today, greater than any other drug or gambling, “ said Dr Peter Anderson, Professor of Substance Use, Policy and Practice, Institute of Health and Society, Newcastle University, and co-leader of the project, speaking at the report’s launch yesterday.

“Our aim with this policy brief is to help decision makers across the EU and beyond break the negative pattern of harmful alcohol consumption and costs by providing much needed scientific input to the discussion, which has long been dominated by the alcohol industry lobbyists,” he added.
(Source: Alcohol Reports, News, 05/21/12) onmedica.com, 05/17/12

INVITED SEMINAR, 23 FEBRUARY 2012, LONDON by Rand Corp.
PROVISIONAL SCOPE AND PURPOSE
In the context of growing policy interest in pricing policy as a tool to address alcohol harms, researchers from the European Commission co-financed by the ALICE RAP project1 and RAND Corporation, organised an invitation-only meeting of policy-makers and researchers working on alcohol pricing and related issues.
The meeting aimed to address some of the specific questions policy-makers in the UK are confronting as they consider policy options. With a focus on excise taxation, minimum pricing, restrictions on promotions and discounts, and bans on below cost sales, some of the specific questions for discussion included:
· the implications of the various policy options for different segments of the population;
· the impact of different policies on fiscal revenue;
· pass-through from tax changes to consumer prices;
· the effects of pricing approaches on the use of other substances like tobacco and illicit drugs, illegal alcohol consumption, cross-border trade, etc.
· the difference for on- and off-trade sales of different pricing policies. ….
(Source: Alcohol Reports, 05/18/12) alicerap.eu

Alcohol consumption among Dutch 11 and 13-year-olds has decreased substantially in the past five years. Dutch kids are also the happiest in both Europe and North America.

This is the conclusion of a major international survey into the health and welfare of children between the age of 11 and 15, the results of which were published on Wednesday.

The survey, entitled Health Behaviour in School-Aged Children (HBSC), shows that young Dutch teenagers drink less, smoke less cannabis and tobacco and engage less often in unsafe sex than most of their peers in the 39 countries covered by the HBSC report. Just five years ago, they were still among the top ten.
(Source: Alcohol Reports, 05/10/12) Radio Netherlands, 05/02/12

The publication “Policy paper providing guidance to policy makers for developing coherent policies for licit and illicit drugs” is online available at Groupe Pompidou (in the frame of the Council of Europe) Download (Englisch). (Source: infoset.ch, 13.04.12)

Prevention of Teen Substance Abuse Must Start with Tackling America’s Underage Drinking Epidemic. Let’s Make it Cool for Teens Not to Drink!

Joseph A. Califano, Jr.A recent survey of 7th through 11th graders in the Connecticut gold coast town of Westport, Connecticut, nails the importance of targeting alcohol use among teens for parents, teachers, pediatricians and public health professionals who seek to prevent teen substance abuse and addiction.

The survey by the Governor’s Prevention Initiative for Youth revealed that 25 percent of the town’s 9th graders, 37 percent of 10th graders, and 60 percent of 11th graders had been drinking alcohol in the previous 30 days. Translated from substance abuse statistical jargon to plain English, this means that these high school freshman, sophomores and juniors are current drinkers, likely drinking regularly. … (Source: CASA, Chairman’s Corner, 11/15/11)

our online-comment:
As long as politicians are not willing to reduce the harmful impact of the alcohol industry on society (TV-marketing is only one sector of many) in order to reduce alcohol consumption in general, youth will miss the good example and will hardly be convinced by educational prevention. Alcohol-lobbies are a sort of corruption. Not only in the Third World.

We investigated tobacco companies’ knowledge about concurrent use of tobacco and alcohol, their marketing strategies linking cigarettes with alcohol, and the benefits tobacco companies sought from these marketing activities.
We performed systematic searches on previously secret tobacco industry documents, and we summarized the themes and contexts of relevant search results. … (Source: Alcohol Reports, 08/20/11)

Drugs, alcohol and gambling are all vices that have ruined the lives of athletes. Even the greatest and most talented players in the world have succumbed to these vices, which inhibit their ability to play and drain them financially.
The vices may be different, but the outcome is generally the same: Athletes that get caught up in these worlds ruin their careers and never live up to their potential.
Here are the athletes that had their playing and coaching days cut short and ruined perfectly good careers. … (Source: Join Together, 08/12/11) bleacherreport.com, 08/8/11